Statement by President Barroso at the final press conference of the European Council

European Council Press Conference

Brussels, 29 October 2010

Yesterday our focus was on making Europe's economy stronger and more stable. And there was real progress and we hope that this progress will be confirmed now by all institutions at the European level.

We need to take these important measures internally. At the same time we need to have in mind the global context, because the long-term growth of our economy depends also on the health of the global environment. That is why I am glad that the President of the European Council and I, representing the European Union, have received a strong mandate to promote the global governance reforms with our partners in the G20. The Heads of State and Government have accepted the points that together we have presented to the European Council in terms of the agenda for the G20 and the agenda for the very important Summits that we have very soon.

I am also happy that my letter with our key principles for Cancun had a very positive reception and in fact the conclusions of the European Council on Cancun are also important.

The goal for Cancun remains a balanced set of decisions which keep up the momentum towards an international framework to keep global temperature increase below 2°C. We will, of course, do everything we can to keep this goal alive.

It is going to be difficult negotiations, but we believe this can be achieved having in mind our goal for a comprehensive global binding agreement.

We had afterwards a very interesting discussion and I think this is an important development at the European Council – not only to work on the conclusions in written form, but to have a real debate among leaders on what our priorities are for trade, for development, that we are going to discuss in the G20 for our relations with our main partners. Of course a very important summit is the one with President Obama where and I think more that ever we need a strong transatlantic partnership.

I think some people thought that a transatlantic partnership was in the past in terms of the Cold war. I completely disagree. More than ever we need a strong transatlantic partnership. The issues globally are so important that I am sure that if the United States and Europe work together there is a pretty good chance that we do much more to defend and promote our interests and our values.